The Signaling Effect of Stock Repurchase on Equity Offerings in Korea

자기주식매입의 유상증자에 대한 신호효과

We investigate the signaling effect of repurchase preceding new equity issue using Korean data. In a short time span, firms announce stock repurchases and equity offerings. The proximity of two events in Korean firms indicates that those are not independent of each other. In this paper, we test the signaling effect of repurchase on equity offerings on the two measures. One is announcement effect, which is measured as CAR(0, +2). The other is the effectiveness which is measured as CAR(0, +30) because the price movement during this window influences on the price of new issues. Previous studies that stock repurchase convey positive signal to equity offerings-Billet and Xue(2004) and Jung(2004)-construct sample without the limit of time interval between two events. This causes the unclear relation between those because of the long time interval. In this study we consider only samples of being within one year each other to reduce this problem and clarify the signal of repurchase on equity offerings. Korean firms are allowed to repurchase own shares with two different method. One is direct repurchase as same as open market repurchase. The other is stock stabilization fund and stock trust fund which trust company or bank buy and sell their shares on the behalf of firms. Generally, the striking different characteristic between direct repurchase and indirect repurchase is following. Direct repurchase is applied by more strict regulation than indirect repurchase. Therefore, the direct repurchase is more informative signal to the equity offering than the indirect repurchase. We construct two sample firms- firms with direct repurchase preceding-equity offerings and indirect repurchase-preceding equity offering, and one control firms-equity offerings only firms-to investigate the announcement effect and the effectiveness of repurchases. Our findings are as follows. Direct repurchase favorably affect the price of new issues favorably. CAR(0, +2) of firms with direct repurchase is not different from that of equity offerings only firms but CAR(0, +30) is higher than that of equity offerings only firms. For firms with indirect repurchase and equity offerings, Both the announcement effect and the effectiveness does not exist. Jung(2004) suggest the possibilities of how indirect stock repurchase can be regarded as one of unfair trading practices on based on the survey results that financial managers of some of KSE listed firms have been asked of their opinion on the likelihood of the stock repurchase being used in unfair trading. This is not objective empirical evidence but opinion of financial managers. To investigate whether firms announce false signal before equity offerings to boost the price of new issues, we calculate the long-run performance following equity offerings. If firms have announced repurchase to boost the price of new issues intentionally, they would undergo the severe underperformance. The empirical results do not show the severer underperformance of both sample firms than equity offerings only firms. The suggestion of false signaling of repurchase preceding equity offerings is not supported by our evidence.

자기주식매입 공시 후 1년 이내에 유상증자를 실시한 표본을 이용하여 자기주식의 유상증자에 대한 신호효과를 검증하였다. 자기주식직접매입은 유상증자의 신주발행가격을 부양시키는 반면, 자기주식펀드 및 신탁은 신주발행가격을 끌어올리는 역할을 하지 못함을 발견했다. 또한 자기주식매입이 유상증자 시 신주발행가격을 올리기 위한 거짓신호로 사용된 가능성을 검증하기 위해서 표본집단들과 대응집단의 장기성과를 비교하였다. 자기주식매입이 선행된 표본들은 유상증자에 비해 장기저성과정도가 심하지 않았으며, 자기주식 펀드 및 신탁이 선행된 유상증자기업의 장기성과 또한 대응집단과 유의하게 다르지 않다는 실증결과를 발견하였다. 따라서 자기주식매입이 신주발행가격의 시세조정을 위해 불공정하게 사용되고 있다는 기존의 주장에 대한 증거를 발견하지 못하였다.